Patience is a virtue

This whole waiting thing is driving me crazy and I have now turned into a skeptical cynic.

After numerous phone calls and strangely worded emails from my very cheap flights travel agent (I’m being kind by not naming them, and also scared of the retributions i.e. I’ll not bad mouth them till I leave eh? Wouldn’t want my flight to be cancelled again and have to, god forbid, go through the trauma of having to manage a conversation with them again. Sigh. Anyway, I’ll continue), I’m now booked onto the same flights leaving on Monday 25th March. Paul and Tim from The Adventure Company have been nothing short of fantastic, accommodating the MANY airline time changes, even booking me an extra night hotel as at one point I was going to have to hang around and wait for the next tour group to go out (better than playing catch up with mine who will now be preparing for Lukla).

It is this that makes me sad. One week ago here I was thinking, ‘it’s ok, in one week you will be heading up Everest and all the things that are making you sad and cross right now will be put into perspective’ and here we are, at one week, and I am still sad and cross. Well, mostly cross.

And with all this extra time there is way too much thinking going on, and thinking only leads to one thing-unnecessary stress. So, instead of my 4 day turnover where, ok yes it was manic but I managed to pretty much get everything sorted without allowing myself the time to freak out over the whole ‘I’m trekking to Everest Base Camp on abysmal training’ thing, I AM FREAKING OUT! Sigh.

We trudged around in the snow again today, firstly to find a snow shovel (cars had to be abandoned) and secondly to get groceries. We failed in the first and somewhat succeeded in the second, though now my back does hurt a bit and my body has that ‘I’ve done loads of trudging’ ache about it which is I think what is scaring me. My body is going to HATE ME by the end of this trek. Perhaps I should do some prophylactic grovelling and apologising?

''I am so sorry body that I have abandoned you, I have not prepared you physically or mentally for the enormous task ahead. Not only do you not know a single person on this trip but you have NEVER done anything as epic as this before and look, the first time you try to something worthwhile with your life it goes wrong and you get a mini ear-full about being an irresponsible traveller etc etc''.

Why is going with the flow so damn difficult?! Plenty of other people manage just fine, why can’t I?!

Yesterday, I embraced the whole ‘snow’ and ‘cancelled flight’ malarky. Today, it’s a royal pain in the ass because my onward flights after Everest will be affected. I will lose money having to change it or book an entirely new flight to Kochi (to family) and on top of that, instead of the week I had there to chill, buy a suitcase and fill it with normal clothes (and by normal I mean Indian salwars) I now have 3 days. Why just 3 days? Because I have another flight booked to Chennai where my work with Saphara will begin, a 5 day insight into the work carried out by EcoFemme in Auroville. So you see, domino effect. Oh, and did I also mention how my helicopter rescue insurance also now needs changed but can’t be checked into whether it actually CAN be changed until Monday. Then of course there is the whole thing that I have no idea whether I will even be able to fly on Monday as the weather people keep telling me this ‘arctic belt’ is not leaving any time soon. Help.

In the words of The Script, ‘Just praying to a God that I don’t believe in’.

2 comments

Oh you poor thing – I too would be stressing out. Just the thought of a cancelled flight is now stressing me out seeing what you are going through. Months of planning and ……. aaaargh!! Never mind – chin up, there are worse things that could happen 🙂